-Caveat Lector- From: Xxx Yyy <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Anyway, it will be up to the >religious leaders to make sure that members of their congregations work at >keeping the religious component alive in their personal lives and not depend >on the larger community to do their work for them. It will be up to them to >remind their followers that Winter Holidays are being celebrated at the same >time Christmas is and not to confuse the two.
This is nothing new; one of the reasons for the Restoration (the overthrow of the Cromwellian government in England in the 1600s) was due to the fact that the Puritanical government had outlawed all secular forms of Christmas celebration...the only thing that was allowed was to attend chuch on Christmas Day. It seems that all of the scandalous secular celebratory customs were just too popular for the general public to give up for long... Indeed, New England for more than 2 centuries tended to adhere to the edicts of its Puritan ancestors and did not have secular Christmas displays (indeed many New England communities outright outlawed such displays), and they looked aghast at what they thought quite scandalous behaviour by their New York State neighbors, descendents of the original Dutch immigrants who continued the quite merry secular Christmas customs of the Netherlands. In fact, it was the documenting of such customs in The Knickerbocker Tales (from which comes the Rip Van Winkle legend) that introduced many Dutch Christmas customs into the American consciousness, such as the concept of Sinte Klaas, Dutch for "Saint (Ni)cholas", which got anglified into "Santa Claus"; and the custom of leaving one's shoes out for Sinte to fill with candy and toys, which was modified into hanging stockings on the fireplace mantle....before the early to mid 1800s, one would have been hard pressed to find any sign of the Christmas season in New England, save for the devout Yankees attending church on the morning of December 25th. June <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds—is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector. ======================================================================== Archives Available at: http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html <A HREF="http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html";>Archives of [EMAIL PROTECTED]</A> http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/ <A HREF="http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/";>ctrl</A> ======================================================================== To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Om
